Comments (0)Daring To Lead
Parshat Chukkat-Balak
July 03, 2009Rabbi Deborah Wechsler
Special to the Jewish Times
At a recent gathering of rabbis from across the Jewish spectrum, we shared the ways in which each of our movement’s organizations and institutions had responded to the recession. Without exception, there had been budget cuts, layoffs, salary cuts, givebacks and closings.
Then, we shared, with no small measure of amazement, that in each case there was an institution or organization where the leader in chief had taken all or some of these measures with his or her staff, but had not altered his own position in any way.
How can it be that a leader would fail to cast his lot with that of the people whom he leads? We come from a tradition that teaches that when we care about someone, our soul is tied up with their soul. This means that the destiny and legacy of a Jewish leader is tied up with the destiny of his people, a teaching that is central to the troubling incident in this week’s parshah.
The central story in Parshat Chukkat (with all due respect to the Red Heifer) is the famous and puzzling narrative of Moses and the rock. In this narrative, the people of Israel find themselves once again without water to drink and come to Moses and Aaron to complain. After taking counsel with God, Moses is instructed, “Take the rod and assemble the community, and before their very eyes order the rock to yield its water (Numbers 20:8).”
You know the denouement — Moses yells at the people, strikes the rock twice and water comes pouring out; but the tragic conclusion to this incident at what the Torah calls the Waters of Strife is that Moses is prevented from entering the land of Israel.
Let me share one interesting Midrash which hints at a reason and teaches something of what it means to be a Jewish leader. Midrash Tanhuma says, “The Holy One said to Moses: Moses, how can you ask to enter the Land? It is like a shepherd who set out to tend the king’s sheep, and the sheep were lost. The shepherd then asked to be admitted to the king’s palace. The king said to him: People will say that you lost the sheep.”
What is interesting is that the Midrash does not assign to the shepherd (read: Moses) any wrongdoing, yet still sees him as responsible for what happened to the sheep (read: children of Israel).
Essentially, every leader has a share in the acts of his people — positive, negative, sins, or mitzvot, anything committed while under his leadership becomes his. The Midrash goes on to say, “Shall you be praised for liberating six hundred thousand and burying them in the desert, while you take in a new generation? Then it will be said that the generation of the desert has no place in the world to come. Rather, lie with them and enter with them.” Regardless of wrongdoing (or as the Midrash seems to say, lack thereof) a leader’s very life and soul is tied up with that of his people.
Our model, as people face troubling times and various hardships, is the God of the Exodus. As the children of Israel were suffering under Pharaoh, God responded by saying, Sham’ati et na’akat Bnei Yisrael. “God hearkens to the outcry of His children.”
My teacher, Rabbi Judith Hauptman, charmingly explains this verse as saying that God is the very first political leader to say, I feel your pain. This then is a model for difficult days: Burdens are shared (and lightened!) by leaders and their people. Be wary of those who say “you” and, like the wicked child at the Seder, fail to include themselves among their people. Demand responsibility, integrity and self-inclusion from all those in our community who dare to lead.
Shabbat Shalom.
Rabbi Deborah Wechsler serves Chizuk Amuno Congregation.-